Together with Women in Quantum Development (WIQD), we launched our ‘Childcare Pilot Programme’ at the Q2B 2021 Conference in Santa Clara last night.

For quantum technology to reach its next milestones, we need to invest in a growing, more diverse pool of expertise from across the world. Too often, we see that women in particular face barriers that we believe can be tackled with creative solutions.

Our quantum childcare pilot programme aims to reduce some of the most pressing issues that prevent women from engaging in Europe’s fast-growing quantum community.

While there are many issues that are worth tackling, we will start this programme with a focus on helping women with young children. This is not to say that childcare is a women-only issue – but it certainly impacts women more than men. For example, we want to explore how to support childcare arrangements for (international) conference attendance. This is key to quantum R&D and education efforts, as well as to the successful careers of women in the field. Career setbacks resulting from reduced ability to travel don’t only impact the years when they happen, but continue to have repercussions throughout the decades of a woman’s career.

Our approach will be to ask the women in the quantum computing community how they personally could use financial support to cover the cost of childcare while traveling, and compensate them as such.

Hence, from 1 January 2022 onwards, women in quantum working in the Netherlands can apply for a personal grant via this page on our website.